Wednesday, March 29, 2006

Irish Writer Mary Morrissy to Read from Her Work, April 13

Chestertown, MD, March 29, 2006 — Washington College's Sophie Kerr Committee presents Irish writer, Mary Morrissy, reading from her fiction, Thursday, April 13, at 4:30 p.m. in the Sophie Kerr Room of the Miller Library. The event is free and open to the public.

A recipient of the Hennessy Award for short fiction and the Lannan Literary Prize, Morrissy will read from two of her critically acclaimed novels,Mother of Pearl (Scribner, 1995/Jonathan Cape, 1996) and The Pretender (Jonathan Cape, 2000), as well as her collection of short stories,A Lazy Eye (London, Jonathan Cape/ New York, Scribner, 1993). Born in Dublin in 1957, Morrissy captures the often dark and complex psychology of her characters. John Banville, literary editor at the Irish Times, has called her "one of the subtlest and most penetrating of the latest generation of Irish writers."

The reading is sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Committee, which works to carry on the legacy of the late Sophie Kerr, a writer from Denton, Md., whose generosity has done so much to enrich Washington College's literary culture. When she died in 1965, Kerr left the bulk of her estate to the College, specifying that one half of the income from her bequest be awarded every year to the senior showing the most "ability and promise for future fulfillment in the field of literary endeavor" and the other half be used to bring visiting writers to campus, to fund scholarships, and to help defray the costs of student publications.